In Every Universe

16. Cameron

SIXTEEN

CAMERON

“Only one bed,” Zacky said, tossing his duffel onto the king-size bed in their resort. Originally when Shane booked this trip to Punta Cana for All-Star break, everyone got their own room. But then Marshall Aranda got traded from Philly, and Elliott invited him on a trip to a fully booked resort. Everyone was happy for the extra company, but it meant six guys in five hotel rooms. It went unspoken that Cameron and Zacky would share. Neither of them minded.

“Just like home,” Cameron said. Sure, they had two beds at home, but Zacky had been exclusively sleeping in Cameron’s for weeks. It made sense. Cut down on the sheets they needed to wash. They usually got up at the same time anyway, and that way they could plan breakfast before they got out of bed. And while Zacky’s head was getting better and the medical staff thought he could start skating after All-Star break, Cameron still worried when they were apart. He liked being able to roll over in the middle of the night and confirm Zacky was breathing.

“This place is nice,” Zacky said, a drink already in hand. While he was cleared to do a lot, he wasn’t cleared to drink yet, so he had a Shirley Temple, complete with a cherry on a tiny sword. Cameron had a beer.

“Way better than last year,” Cameron said. They’d come to a resort pretty close to this one last year with the same group and enjoyed a lot about it. But this year’s was all-inclusive, and the rooms they had were bigger.

“Yeah, I remember that like it was yesterday,” Zacky said. He gave Cameron a flat c’mon now look.

“I’m sorry.” Cameron set his beer down and opened his suitcase on the bed to fish his swim trunks out. Zacky did the same, and they turned away from each other for some modesty as they changed. Cameron was trying his hardest lately to keep his eyes to himself. The feelings that were growing for Zacky were new, and their friendship wasn’t something he was willing to mishandle or take advantage of.

They met Marshall, Elliott, Shane, and Micah on the beach, each with a drink in their hand. Cameron had to remind himself that even though he was worried about Zacky, he was cleared to swim in the ocean. It would probably do him a lot of good, since he was at least forty-nine percent merman.

“You remember that girl from last year?” Elliott asked, t-shirt balled up under his head as a pillow in the sand.

“She doesn’t remember you,” Shane said.

“If we’ll all get on the same page here, I don’t remember anything about last year,” Zacky said. His interactions with people outside of Cameron had been stilted, as he had to reestablish friendships and relationships around the organization. Being open about his memory loss with the whole team was new, but as he started doing more workouts, and being around the team a little more off ice, it would have been more difficult for him to try to hide it.

“Same,” Marshall said in solidarity. It made Zacky smile, which got Marshall major points in Cameron’s book. Marshall also understood the joy that came from Brian being healthy scratched their last game and then sent down to the A before All- Star break. Marshall had just gotten traded, and he was already annoyed with Brian. He and Cameron were bonding over it.

If there was ever an argument for Zacky’s necklace being lucky, Brian getting sent down was it.

“This trip we’re making new memories,” Micah declared, raising his bright red blended margarita to toast the rest of the group.

New memories were exactly what they all needed.

There was a club in the resort where the boys went dancing the first night there. But it was loud, and Zacky was visibly uncomfortable. It wasn’t long until he and Cameron ended up back down at the empty beach, their feet in soft sand, the water lapping over them surprisingly warm.

“I don’t fit here,” Zacky told the ocean as the moon’s reflection wobbled toward them on the black water. Cameron had never been somewhere more beautiful than the very spot they were standing in, and there was no one else he’d rather be with.

Zacky, as always, was longing for somewhere else. Someone else.

“Next year we can pick a different spot. Maybe Hawaii? Or I know some guys go to St. Thomas.”

“That’s not what I mean.” Zacky’s arms were crossed tightly over his chest as he stared down at the water like he was about to argue with it.

Cameron knew. He stepped behind Zacky and wrapped his arms around him. The sand made them feel like the same height, and he nuzzled against Zacky’s cheek.

“Tell me about him. About your Cameron.” He could feel Zacky’s smile, cheek to cheek.

“He’s such a nerd. He knows so much about houses now. When you retire, I can tell you, you’d love being a realtor. He got into pickleball with some of his coworkers, and he has to double brace his knee, but the outfits he wears are so fucking cute. He was going to make the cutest dad in the world, and now I’ll never get to see that.”

When Zacky talked about his husband, there were moments it collapsed into talking about Cameron as one entity. And sometimes, the things he said made him sure Zacky was from somewhere else.

“Maybe that guy would be a stranger to me.”

“Because he wants kids?”

“Yeah,” Cameron said, thinking about the choices he was making for his own life. There were times when he pictured tying tiny skates or lighting birthday candles. Writing out one of those first-day-of-school chalkboards. But any kid would be better off without him. “You sure he wants them?”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Zacky said with a chuckle. There was something he wasn’t telling Cameron, and it was weird to have a secret between the two of them.

“What?” he prodded.

“I’m not going to offend your delicate ears, but trust me, I know.”

Cameron let it go. It was nice to think that there was a version of himself somewhere who was healed enough to want kids.

“Tell me about your wedding.”

“It was a good day. Sunny. We got married in my folks’ backyard, with all my mom’s flowers in full bloom.”

“That sounds nice.”

“It was. You were full dimples the whole day. That’s what I remember about it the most. How hard it was to kiss you because you wouldn’t stop fucking smiling. All I was getting was teeth.”

You. You. You . It sounded like Zacky was talking about him. About the two of them. The ones on the beach together in that moment. Other Cameron felt far away.

“That reminds me of when we won the Cup,” Cameron said, pulling Zacky closer to him, in case he slid out of his grip and washed away into the ocean. “I have never seen you smile as much as you did that night. That whole first week.”

“I feel bad for other Zacky. In my universe now. He won a Stanley Cup, and everyone is sitting around thinking he quit before making it to the show and now is trying to become a gym teacher. He must feel insane.”

“Other Cameron believes him.” If Cameron knew anything about the internal logic of what was happening in Zacky’s brain, he could only assume that in the universe Zacky thinks he came from, where his closest friendship was actually his marriage, and where he quit his dream in order to be with the person he loved, his husband must feel like Cameron did here and now. That what was technically real didn’t matter because the important thing was how Zacky experienced his reality. And if something was real to Zacky, it was real to Cameron.

Zacky sagged in his arms, and Cameron could feel Zacky’s tears on his own cheek, still pressed close. He turned his head enough to buss a kiss there, cheek wet and stubbly, and held his friend when he turned around in Cameron’s arms for a hug.

The resort wasn’t quiet; it was filled with guests getting drunk and shouting, music playing, distant conversations. But Cameron had the open vastness of the ocean—dark, scary, limitless, and beautiful—and he also had his favorite person in the world with him.

And he knew, in that moment, that if Zacky quit hockey now, either because he had to become a gym teacher right now or because his head wouldn’t allow him to get back on the ice, Cameron would follow him anywhere. Whether or not Zacky quit hockey in another universe for Cameron was negligible. He would have , and Cameron was willing to do the same in return.